Final Report Summary - KARMA (Knowledge Based Process planning and Design for Additive Layer Manufacturing)
Executive Summary:
European industry must search for a chance in customized and hi-tech products, trying to take advantage of its supremacy regarding new technologies development. Aerospace industry, automotive industry, medical implants, hi-end equipments industry, consumer products, protection and safety are the target sectors -which include more than a million of European enterprises in real need of customized product. Additive Layer Manufacturing (ALM) -also known as Free Form Fabrication and formerly Rapid Manufacturing-, is a novel fabrication method of parts directly from the electronic model by layered manufacturing, using active principles such as laser and electron beam.
Currently, ALM is the first and the best option for short series of customized products. However, layered manufacturing has remaining challenges. Part properties, dimensional accuracy and surface quality depend strongly on process planning, and sometimes prevent ALM parts to be considered as fully functional.
The objective of KARMA is to respond to above mentioned challenges with a knowledge-based engineering system (KBE) that can assess the optimal process planning and estimate functional properties of ALM parts automatically in real time. The KBE system, through a set of propietary algorithms, defines the optimal technological scenario automatically and executes a virtual test of the fabricated part. The KBE system includes a database with relevant properties on machine systems, processing parameters as well as raw and processed materials for the most relevant ALM technologies.
With KARMA it is possible to:
• Choose the most appropriate technology, material and build scenario for the product that will be build by ALM.
• Define a full mechanical and thermal characterization of ALM
• Improve efficiency in designing for ALM
• Manage the commercial relationship between ALM Associations and their member users (and any other external user)
• Give a boost to ALM certification for crucial sectors (i.e. biomedical, aerospace
As a final necessary step, an Exploitation Plan to regulate the commercial and IPR relations among the KARMA partners has been drafted, describing the agreements and decisions reached in order to make KARMA available on the market.
All required information can be found at www.karmaproject.eu
Project Context and Objectives:
Mass production is shifted towards the countries with lower factor cost. European industry must search for a chance in customized and hi-tech products, trying to take advantage of its supremacy regarding new technologies development. Aerospace industry, automotive industry, medical implants, hi-end equipments industry, consumer products, protection and safety are the target sectors -which include more than a million of European enterprises in real need of customized product.
Additive Layer Manufacturing (ALM) -also known as Free Form Fabrication and formerly Rapid Manufacturing-, is a novel fabrication method of parts directly from the electronic model by layer manufacturing, using active principles such as laser and Electron beams. Currently, ALM is the first and the best option for short series of customized products. However, layered manufacturing is not without challenges. Part properties, dimensional accuracy and surface quality depend strongly on process planning, and sometimes prevent ALM parts to be considered as fully functional. The objective of KARMA is to respond to above mentioned challenges with a knowledge-based engineering system (KBE) that can estimate functional properties of ALM parts automatically and in short time. The KBE system will define the optimal production parameters automatically and execute a virtual test of the fabricated part. The KBE system will include a database with characterized material and part properties for all major ALM technologies. The development of such a KBE system is a difficult and demanding task, which will involve both ALM users and companies from the final customer sectors. A combination of mass production metal IAGs (FEMEVAL) and ALM IAGs (ASERM, AFPR and RAPIMAN) set up the proposal as a cohesion factor between material providers, technology providers, part fabricants and end-users to promote ALM knowledge among all of them
Project Results:
Mass production is shifted towards the countries with lower labor cost. European industry must search for a chance in customized and hi-tech products, trying to take advantage of its supremacy regarding new technologies development. Aerospace industry, automotive industry, medical implants, hi-end equipments industry, consumer products, protection and safety are the target sectors -which include more than a million of European enterprises in real need of customized product. Additive Layer Manufacturing (ALM) -also known as Free Form Fabrication and formerly Rapid Manufacturing-, is a novel fabrication method of parts directly from the electronic model by layered manufacturing, using active principles such as laser and electron beam. Currently, ALM is the first and the best option for short series of customized products. However, layered manufacturing has remaining challenges. Part properties, dimensional accuracy and surface quality depend strongly on process planning, and sometimes prevent ALM parts to be considered as fully functional.
The objective of KARMA is to respond to above mentioned challenges with a knowledge-based engineering system (KBE) that can assess the optimal process planning and estimate functional properties of ALM parts automatically in real time. The KBE system defines the optimal technological scenario automatically and executes a virtual test of the fabricated part. The KBE system includes a database with relevant properties on machine systems, processing parameters as well as raw and processed materials for the most relevant ALM technologies. This project was setup as a combination of mass production metal IAGs (FEMEVAL) and ALM IAGs (ASERM, AFPR and RAPIMAN), being a cohesion factor between material providers, technology providers, part fabricants and end-users so as to promote ALM knowledge among all of them. The development of this KBE system has involved both ALM users and end users from multiple industrial sectors.
During three years of project, the consortium has worked together actively to achieve the project goal, even surpassing the expectations of it with the development of an Expert Process Planning tool for Additive Layer Manufacturing, KARMA SYSTEM, that is divided into two different tools: KARMA WIZARD and KARMA TOOL.
Robustness and good understanding between all project partners have been crucial to the success of the project during three years. This balanced consortium consisted of:
• 4 RTD partners; MIUN and AIMME to characterize the materials and design and define the content and the function of KARMA WIZARD, ECONOLYST and EXETER to design and implement the algorithms to calculate the best build orientation of a part in KARMA tool;
• 4 IAG (FEMEVAL, the project coordinator, AFPR, RAPIMAN and ASERM) that have worked on demonstration and dissemination activities and they have been involved in technical decisions in order to obtain a good tool that satisfied the requirement of the end-users and
• 5 participant SMEs (CASTMOL, RTCZ, PET-EKO, VELYEN, CITIM) have worked on the demonstration tasks, they have been attended training sessions and have gave their feedback to improve the tool, during all project their opinion was essential for the definition of the capabilities of the tool together with the RTD partners.
Achieved results:
As mentioned above, KARMA is an Expert Process Planning Tool for Additive Layer Manufacturing. With KARMA it is possible to:
• Choose the most appropriate technology, material and build scenario for the product that will be build by ALM. KARMA WIZARD contains information about ALM technologies, machines, materials and build parameters. Moreover, KARMA WIZARD allows the end user to find the most appropriate material for given requirements.
• Full mechanical and thermal characterization of ALM, in order to know the real properties of parts that were made by these technologies and to study the anisotropy behavior of processed material. KARMA WIZARD contains tested parameters with the European standards that were following in the tested works.
• Efficiency in designing for ALM – a KBE tool (KARMA TOOL) does an efficient and automatic process planning that analyze the critical issues (surface finish, build time, costs, material waste, etc.) before the part production is launched. KARMA TOOL is developed in a friendly interface and guided the user to obtain the best build orientation for the compliance the requirements of parts.
• Give a boost to ALM certification for crucial sectors (biomedical, aerospace….), since there is a register of the build parameters and a complete characterization of the ALM materials, what is essential to ensure the traceability of data.
Differences between the developed work and the initial proposal planning:
• At the beginning of the project, four ALM technologies were selected: two for polymers ( Stereolitography-SLA and Laser Sintering –SLS) and two for metals (Selective Laser Melting-SLM and Electron Beam Melting-EBM). For each technology two materials were tested Protogen 18420 and Somos NeXt for SLA; PA2200 and PA3200 for SLS; CL20 Stainless steel and CL5 hot working steel for SLM and Ti6Al4V and CoCr ASTM 75 for EBM. For each material, two different build scenarios were evaluated in two different orientations horizontal and vertical. Finally, sample parts were build and tested to obtain real properties of that materials.
The design and the implementation of KARMA database was developed to obtain a tool that could be expanded with data of new technologies, machines and materials. To demonstrate this database property, two different actions were made by the partners:
1. A new deliverable D5.8. Roadmap for introduction of new technologies and materials was developed in order to document how to expand Karma system with new technologies and materials. ECONOLYST and AIMME worked together to document all relevant information to add new data into the KARMA SYSTEM.
2. PET EKO made some tests and followed the procedure from the KARMA Roadmap produced during the project to add a new technology (PolyJet), new machine (Eden300), new materials (Duruswhite, Fullcure720, Veroblack and Veroblue) and the testing results to KARMA database.
• KARMA TOOL is a software tool that orientates parts to be build with ALM technologies to obtain the best orientation depending on some features like costs estimation, build time and volume support predictions and final roughness prediction for a selected build scenario parameters. The additional work undertaken in KARMA TOOL is listed below:
o A new deliverable titled D4.3a. Development and release of a KARMA alpha version was added to the project. It was aimed at delivering an alpha version of the KARMA software for in-house testing purposes. The idea was to release a software prototype system that can be tested and evaluated by the RTD partners of the KARMA project before the tool is handed over to the SME partners for their feedback. Additionally, this alpha release will be demonstrated at various conferences and public events in order to get an early feedback from the potential users of the KARMA system.
o Development of different algorithms to calculate costs, build time, volume support, roughness and manufacturability. Different tests have been developed in order to improve the accuracy of the algorithms for each technology.
o Graphical improvements have been made to clarify the preview of parts during Karma process.
o Advanced cost results. With this option it is possible to predict the maximum number of parts that can be made in a chamber and the cost per part in that case. Moreover it is possible to obtain the cost per part of specific number of parts.
o Implementation of a user feedback/bug reporting system.
o Security fix: An authentication mechanism was added to the KARMA tool. Using this mechanism only authorised users who are logged into the KARMA website can interact with the KARMA tool.
o Multi-language support: A multi-lingual feature was added to the KARMA system. Using this feature, the KARMA system can be translated to new languages. Additionally, the KARMA TOOL menus were also translated into French and Spanish language.
o Faster initial calculations: During previous releases of KARMA, a part was evaluated for the cost, surface roughness and build time calculations for all the available build scenarios in the database. In the current release of KARMA, these computations only take place for the qualifying build scenarios which are a result of a user selection. The fewer initial calculations mean that a user is presented with the initial calculations results faster than before.
o Improved look and feel: The overall KARMA tool look and feel was improved by adding new icons and graphics.
o Direct route to compute final calculations: Based upon the feedback of the users, a direct route to the KARMA final calculations was added. Using this option, a user can skip the orientation calculations step of the KARMA process and directly obtain the computations results of the given orientation of a part.
o Final results report: A new feature was added to the KARMA tool that enables its end users to create a report of the final results of the KARMA system. The report contains the following information:
• Original part information
• Selected Fabrication Scenario details
• Selected Orientation
• Manufacturability information
• Final results
o Bug fixes and performance improvements: Additionally, several Bug fixes and performance improvements were carried out.
• MANAGEMENT LAYER DEVELOPMENT AND IMPLEMENTATION IN THE TOOL. The need for a management layer was discussed during the KARMA technical and management meetings. It was desirable to have a mechanism for the IAGs to have the KARMA tool and the wizard embedded on their website so their clients do not have to visit the KARMA website directly. Additionally, it was agreed that it is important to provide the end users with a functionality to add their un-verified data to the KARMA system with a user profile classification. This is very important for the KARMA future expansion point of view. The Management layer definition connects KARMA features with the exploitation requirements and the business model selected for this tool.
o The KARMA tool and the wizard are now embeddable on the IAG websites. However, they are still hosted on the KARMA server. This scheme makes the future upgrades and modification of the KARMA easier as it can be accomplished from a single place. Additionally, access of the IAGs to the KARMA tool and the wizard is controlled by the administrator.
o IAG and their clients can add their own verified/unverified scenario data on the KARMA server. This data is stored on the KARMA database server.
o The scenario data visibility is achieved according to three levels of management layer structure i.e. global level, IAG level and client level. The data added by an end user (an IAG client), by default, is not visible to other users.
o The IAGs have an ability to share their data (with appropriate permission from the owners of the data) with:
a) All of their clients
b) Other IAGs
c) Make data globally available ( Karma Validation Procedure-KVP)
o Unverified scenario data can be submitted to the KARMA administrator for validation in order to make it globally visible. Note: Only the data provided at the global level needs to be validated before making it available to the users (following KVP).
o The KARMA system incorporates a colouring scheme to highlight the unverified data to its end users.
o IAGs can classify their users as ‘Premium’, ‘Advanced’ and ‘Basic’ users.
o The KARMA system administrator can monitor the number of assigned users by a certain IAG and their profiles for licensing purposes. However, the end users (clients) are only administered by the IAGs themselves.
• As it was planned in the proposal, training material was developed during the last year as a KARMA manual user. Moreover different videos were made to demonstrate the capability of the system and like a training tool. Now, there is a long version of the video but it is planned to divide this video into different training sessions for easy compression.
At the end of the project, the consortium has agreed that the final results have been reached and their expectations have been overcome by the development of a system very close to a commercial tool.
Potential Impact:
During the last year of the project, the expected final results have been reached. An Expert Process Planning tool for ALM (Additive Layer Manufacturing) was implemented into a knowledge-based engineering system (KBE) that can estimate functional properties of ALM automatically and analyse the technologies to build some parts depends on user requirements and shows to the user a table with the results of the cost and time to build the part in some selected technologies. After the partner selects a specific technology, Karma calculates all the orientations to build the part in the chamber, and for each orientation the software predicts the cost of the part, the build time, the surface roughness of the parts and estimates the cost of each parts if the chamber is filled of the same part and how many parts it is able to build.
KARMA System answers relevant challenges in the ALM field, with the following repercussions in the ALM users:
• The possibility of choosing the most appropriate technology, material and build scenario for the product they are launching. It is a good tool to compare technologies and build scenarios.
• Full mechanical and thermal characterisation of ALM parts. There will be no uncertainty regarding what an ALM part can or cannot withstand depending on their build parameters.
• Efficiency in designing for ALM - a KBE tool will do an efficient and automatic process planning that will analyse the critical issues (surface finish, build time, costs, support volume) before the part production is launched.
• Give a boost to ALM certification for crucial sectors like biomedical, automotive or aerospace
The impact of the project results is directly related to the foreseen increase of ALM users and ALM applications, and it is worth remarking that ALM is strongly growing in Europe since the number of installations has tripled in just 7 years (2000-2007), at the same time that a growing number of markets for this technology are being identified.
It is expected that KARMA will be a valuable and exploitable tool to different types of players:
• Machine manufacturers,
• Raw materials' providers,
• ALM software developers,
• Service bureaus,
• Consultants
• Training centres
As ALM permits new challenges to be faced, such as personalization and individualization of product design and allows adding value to the existent products, So, KARMA results will be directly applicable to ALM manufacturing, but also will have significant implications along the consumer sectors.
It is the belief of the KARMA Consortium that this KBE system will make not only a quality step in Design for ALM, but also will make it more accessible to SMEs, increasing their competitiveness in a sustainable way.
To back the potential impact of KARMA, the Consortium started during the project a planned set of dissemination and communication activities in order to reach the main targeted collectives.
• The project website www.karmaproject.eu has been since the beginning the main interface between the project and the public to be addressed, from the scientific community to users in general.
• The KARMA brochure has been widely distributed among Associations' members, attendants to events and stakeholders in general
• Demo videos and training materials are available on demand from the KARMA Consortium
• KARMA has been present at more than 20 international events related to ALM, providing on the one hand a wide forum to present the experiences and results of the project and on the other hand creating strong networking possibilities
• The final period of the project, with the KARMA tool in training, testing and validation processes, has brought the opportunity to directly contact users at SMEs in their own environment, providing valuable feedback that has been used to improve the system and valuable professional and personal links between the KARMA RTD experts and the design and production people that should be, after all, the final beneficiaries and customers of KARMA.
The project ends with the drafting of an Exploitation Plan to regulate the commercial and IPR relations among the KARMA partners. As such, it describes the agreements and decisions reached till the date of its publication. Negotiations are still ongoing in order to fix every single detail, but this document shows that the partners are really committed to an Exploitation Agreement and that strong advances have been made in this sense. To complement these regulations, Exploitation Contracts among SME Associations and RTD Performers are being drafted and will be signed in the next few months by the different partners. Among other things, the Plan addresses:
• The product outcome of the project: the KARMA Tool,
• The different treatment required by maintenance, updates and new versions
• The market sectors and segments where KARMA can be offered (Service Provider, End User, Learning User)
• The types of users and their respective rights:
o Basic User
o Advanced User
o Premium User
• The business model and the management system through which KARMA can be offered to the users
• Estimated costs
List of Websites:
The public website address of the project is www.karmaproject.eu
Relevant contact details are:
FEMEVAL:
Francisco Fideli - ffideli@femeval.es
María José Lladró - mjlladro@femeval.es
Luis Ballester - lballester@femeval.es
Francisco Loras - floras@femeval.es
ASERM
Felip Esteve - festeve@aserm.net
AFPR
Georges Taillandier - g.taillandier@numericable.com
Alain Bernard - alain.bernard@irccyn.ec-nantes.fr
RAPIMAN
Igor Drstvensek - drsti@uni-mb.si
AIMME
Manuel Sánchez - msanchez@aimme.es
Luis Portolés - lportoles@aimme.es
Olga Jordá - ojorda@aimme.es
Voja Petrovic - vpetrovic@aimme.es
UNIEXE
Oana Ghita - O.Ghita@exeter.ac.uk
ECON
Phil Reeves - phil.reeves@econolyst.co.uk
Loic Le Merlus - Loic@econolyst.co.uk
MIUN
Lars-Erik Rännar - lars-erik.rannar@miun.se
CASTMOL
Ibón Mitxelena - imitxele@moldkar.com
RTCZ
Matic Krznar - matic.krznar@rtcz.si
Joze Weingartner - joze.weingartner@rtcz.si
PET-EKO
Mladen Sercer - msercer@fsb.hr
Damir Godec - damir.godec@fsb.hr
VELYEN
Vicente Pérez - velyen@velyen.com
CITIM
Andreas Berkau - berkau@citim.de